Pangloss

Three different Muslim groups declared holy war ("jihad") today. You can debate whether that's the same thing as issuing a fatwah, but I think that's a bit of hair-splitting, even by the standards of extremists. http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,20433599-5005961,00.html

Thanks for the reminder, though. That article has obviously been receiving some major attention since I last visited, and there was some REALLY funny new stuff in there.

If the discussion focuses on politics, e.g. the political implications of the religion, it's fine. If it focuses on religious beliefs and exploring what they mean, how they reward the believer, etc, then it's not fine. It'll be a judgement call in the end.

Partial responses would be my guess. They gave responses on some races, but not others. So for example the respondant might have been willing to disclose how they voted for their senator, but not how they voted for the president. These things happen between annoying pollsters and busy people on their way to or from work, picking up the kids, etc. They're like telemarketers -- people to be shoved aside almost, but not quite, strongly enough to warrant arrest on a charge of assault. (grin)

Just FYI, I'm going to move this thread to the Suggestions/Feedback forum, but I'll leave a stub here so Politics readers will see it. It was discussed a couple of weeks ago by board leadership in private, and then later with the experts. Various suggestions were made, but in the end it was more or less agreed that the Politics board is more closely related to science and than P/RP has been. It's pretty easy to see how politics impacts science. The case for P/RP is not so obvious. And perhaps more to the point, good political discussion goes well with good scientific discussion, so long as it doesn't get out of hand. P/RP... not so much. That's not to say that there's not a lot that one can learn from good P/RP discussion. It's just not what we do here. This board is about science. I actually made the suggestion at one point that we limit threads on the Politics board to areas specifically related to science. But it would be difficult to consistently validate that connection, and it might have a stiffling effect on discussions. So I think that's basically where we are at the moment. P/RP is gone; Politics stays.

Ooo that's a nice writeup. Thanks Dave!

I have a situation where I've got a menu and a small picture area at the top of the menu. In the old design I've got a standard javascript that changes the mouse button and the small picture when the mouse rolls over the button. I'd like to see if I can get rid of all the javascript, though, and just use CSS for the rollovers. I know roughly how to do the CSS rollovers, so the buttons themselves will change. But I can't quite figure out a way to get the picture to change in the small picture area above the menu. Any suggestions would be appreciated. It's not a huge problem if I have to continue to use the javascript rollover method, I'm basically just wondering if it's possible to get rid of it entirely. This is more of an experiment/education thing than a customer requirement.

By the way, that premise about the anonymous vote is something we're going to have to challenge as well. David Brin, author of The Transparent Society, might say that we're neglecting the real issue. If our votes were recorded, then we would be able to compare them with our printed receipts and know for sure exactly what the result was. I believe that's how it's done in the UK. Perhaps it's time to re-open the issue for societal debate.

Well there is a reason to be concerned about the "paper trail" concept, it's just not a very good one. Or rather I should say that it's a valid concern, but it's not enough to justify not having printed voting receipts. The concern is that people will be able to easily forge the printed receipts. Since a citizen's vote is not recorded by the system (that's a right we enjoy -- nobody can look up how we voted and then hold it against us), someone could create fraudulent receipts and claim a different outcome for an election. For example, if your equipment showed 500 votes for so-and-so, and 501 people step forward and said they voted for him (and have "receipts" to prove it), then you have a problem. The reason why I don't believe this concern is sufficient to warrant not giving receipts is that the system is already flawed without it. The addition of another check on the system cannot make it less stable, and it could give you an additional tool for confirmation. So long as people understand the potential problem with receipts, and the need to weigh their message accordingly, they could be a valuable additional tool. So really disagreement over receipts has more to do with human nature and the flaws therein. As I say, those concerns are valid -- there will likely be cases of people stamping their feet and claiming fraud just because the receipts disagree with the system, which would not be sufficient to warrant a new vote, IMO -- but this is clearly not a case of "if it ain't broke" -- it IS broken, and it makes sense to try multiple avenues of repair.

Heh, don't let the ACLU hear that. They're on a major crusade to "restore" something that apparently hasn't been lost after all. (chuckle)

I'm not sure how you equate this with "censorship". Only the government can censor something. This is opt-in stuff. If you don't like it, don't participate. (Or did I misunderstand the site?) What's wrong with helping parents figure out the best time and method to educate their children?

Well, almost. The Arabs of Southeastern Iraq share the same religion as the Persians of Iran. This, of course, is part of the dynamic of the region, and one of the reasons why Iraq has a basis for seeking assistance from Iran. The danger, of course, is that Iran will attempt to dictate Iraqi politics, to the detriment of Sunnis and Kurds.

Sure, but what that doesn't take into account is the fact that "cheap" is a relative term. And what does environmental impact have to do with economic factors? Oil does the same amount of damage whether it costs 50 cents or 5 bucks. That has nothing to do with the concept of "Peak Oil".

It's a good point. Globalization has become the very fabric of the modern American corporation, so it's probably impossible to build an entirely home-grown weapons or military transportation system anymore. An interesting example of this can be seen in the recent fight over which company would produce the next-generation "Marine One" -- the helicopter that flies the president around (amongst other things, of course). The battle came down to Sikorsky, an historic US builder and creator of the famous Black Hawk, and AugustaWestland, a UK-Italian group. Nobody gave AugustaWestland a chance. Sikorsky is a major player in the military-industrial complex, as a member of United Technologies (home of Pratt & Whitney, Carrier, Otis, etc). They developed their competitor in West Palm Beach, where government officials could conveniently fly down in their taxpayer-paid Gulfstream Vs (oh excuse me, "C-37 transport", so sorry!), spend the afternoon flying up and down the beach in the prototype snapping pictures of sunbathers, take in a "fundraiser" dinner at The Breakers and still be home by midnight. What could possibly go wrong? Suprisingly, AugustaWestland won the contract. According to one friend of mine, who has written several currently-popular military aircraft books and has flown both of these helicopters, their design was simply "superior in every way". I imagine that AugustaWestland's pledge to build the choppers here in the US, creating thousands of new jobs, might have had something to do with the victory as well. But I digress. The point I was getting at is that Sikorsky's design uses plenty of foreign parts. Of course you won't find that information very easily, because Sikorsky conveniently "lost" their documentation regarding contracts with China and other nations to supply parts for the design. Allegedly as much as half the aircraft by weight is manufactured overseas, which is not too surprising given that United Technologies has outsourced about half its workforce to China and Brazil over the last few years.

I think it's more than that. They're trying to become the primary player in the region.

It's not psychological. It's... institutional. And it's not without a practical basis, either. Depending on even staunch, historical allies for defensive weaponry and ordnance is a national security risk. Just ask the Iranians about their F-14 Tomcats leftover from the days of the Shah. And of course there is the power of the military-industrial complex, which, because of the size of the Defense budget and Iraq+DHS spending, probably has more influence in Washington than every other lobbying group (including oil, transportation and tobacco) combined.

It's certainly a challenge, isn't it? If you were trying to build a struggling democracy next to the world's most powerful despotic theocracy, with 40%+ of your people religiously controlled by that neighbor and the other ~60% religiously opposed to it, how would you proceed?

Given our recent discussions about political partisanship and polarization, I thought this might be an interesting thing to discuss. Americans will be getting a rather blatant, in-our-faces demonstration this week in how the media fuels and instigates political polarization in this country. CBS ran a 2-hour documentary tonight which it advertised as having "the only footage shot within the World Trade Center on 9/11". NBC is running a special "Dateline" Monday night about the families of United 93 victims. The president himself will be cashing in on the anniversary, with a 20-minute prime time speech tonight at 9pm Eastern. But the grand prize would have to go to ABC. As discussed in this thread, ABC started a controversial mini-series tonight which is alleged to contain accusations aimed at the previous (Democrat) administration. This is the same network that employs, as an "analyst", Richard Clarke, a man who cannot open his mouth without blaming something on the Bush administration (yet doesn't usually stop to mention the fact that he was the National Security Council's expert on counter-terrorism on September 11th, 2001). Meanwhile ABC will be cashing in on 9/11 all week, with special episodes of Primetime, 20/20, and Nightline, premiere stories on Good Morning America produced in glorious widescreen HDTV. ABC went to great lengths to inform us that it had generously decided to present "The Path to 9/11" commercial-free, but in addition to all these shows (which are all quite fully advertised), their web site is chock full of stories, that is if you can find them through all the pharmaceutical, oil company and Wal-Mart ads. Oh, did I mention this is Fall Season Premiere Week? Huh. Not sure how that slipped my mind....

Where were you on 9/11/01?

I tend to agree. But I don't think that's what most people do -- I think they make up their own minds. The question really is how good a job they do of that. It's been my experience that people start out more or less ignorant of socio-political issues, then something sparks their interest. It may be a particular event, or the influence of someone they respect, but suddenly they're very interested in the subject, and begin to learn more about it. At some point they may set aside the partisan influences that sparked their initial interest, and move to a more objective, open-minded position. Or they may not. But whether they do or not depends largely on the availability of alternate influences. If the only fertilized ground available is partisan in nature, then they won't hear logical arguments. (They're the "red states", after all, not the "well-read states".) (Now there's a joke that only works in print....) That's why it's incumbent upon those of us experienced in debate to spread those influences far and wide, as well as remaining open-minded and attentive to alternate points of view.

Thanks for all the comments on this.

It's a new thing that just started a couple of years ago to recognize the importance of the Constitution. They have their own web site and everything, but it's pretty much an ignored holiday by most of the general public because it's not one that people get off from work. A few years ago, we began to (belatedly) celebrate the bicentenial of the Constitution, due mainly to the instigation of several Supreme Court justices and other recognized legal scholars. It's one of the few times I can remember the leadership of the judicial branch becoming actively involved in a socio-political issue, but of course it's not hard to see why. I believe this was one of the eventual outcomes of that raised awareness, although the official recognition of the holiday didn't start until 2004 or 2005. Federal law requires all schools that receive financial aid from the federal government (which is to say, all colleges and universities) are required to observe the day. I'm not really sure exactly what that entails.

(cough) Ooof, that hurt! Okay, I asked for it, I guess I can take it. Increase the morphine drip, doctor!